Crash at Shoreham Air show

[dr_gn]

Dr Jekyll said:

dr_gn said:

So...if the driver of a recklessly driven car doesn't happen to die in an accident that kills some innocent bystander, it's all OK? It's just an accident? Happens all the time?

No one is saying it's OK, just that it's an accident.

dr_gn said:

I'm sure the vast majority of drivers involved in fatal accidents don't set out to crash their cars or kill anyone, but it's probably still going to be manslaughter.

Very rarely, death by dangerous or careless driving perhaps, but not necessarily even that.

Either way, Honeywell was suggesting it's 'nothing like that', the implication seemed to be that it being an aircraft and being a pilot rather than a driver makes it somehow less relevant. Death by dangerous driving can get you a 14 year prison sentence. Obviously in this case it's not driving, but surely the outcome was worse due to the added responsibility of being in control of something potentially far more deadly than a car, and the pilot obviously being well aware of that?

[Mave]

dr_gn said:

I'm sure the vast majority of drivers involved in fatal accidents don't set out to crash their cars or kill anyone, but it's probably still going to be manslaughter. Why would the mode of transpost make the slightest difference?

There are what, 3000 deaths on the roads the UK every year? And approx 500 homicides with 80% being stabbings, shooting, hitting, strangling etc., and driving related cases falling into the 20% "other" category along with corporate manslaughter cases. So it's probably less than 5% of road death cases result in manslaughter.

[ecsrobin]

Death by careless driving appears to attract 60hours community service these days!! http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hampshire-370...

[aeropilot]

BrabusMog said:

You're probably right, but I have no sympathy for him, he took a risk and it had devestating consequences.

You should work for the Daily Wail with statements like that.......

How do you know he took a risk.....oh yeah, you don't, do you.

He might just have made a mistake, as human beings do and will continue to do or there might be many other combinations of factors involved....as yet all unknown.

[HoHoHo]

aeropilot said:

BrabusMog said:

You're probably right, but I have no sympathy for him, he took a risk and it had devestating consequences.

You should work for the Daily Wail with statements like that.......

How do you know he took a risk.....oh yeah, you don't, do you.

He might just have made a mistake, as human beings do and will continue to do or there might be many other combinations of factors involved....as yet all unknown.

Totally agree with you Aeropilot.

Rather sadly he does appear to have a little history which wont help opinions.

[dr_gn]

Mave said:

dr_gn said:

I'm sure the vast majority of drivers involved in fatal accidents don't set out to crash their cars or kill anyone, but it's probably still going to be manslaughter. Why would the mode of transpost make the slightest difference?

There are what, 3000 deaths on the roads the UK every year? And approx 500 homicides with 80% being stabbings, shooting, hitting, strangling etc., and driving related cases falling into the 20% "other" category along with corporate manslaughter cases. So it's probably less than 5% of road death cases result in manslaughter.

What's the difference between "death by dangerous driving" and "manslaughter"? Surely it's pretty much manslaughter applied to road vehicles?

Irrespective of the terms, what I'm getting at is that causing death by accident doesn't absolve anyone from guilt or punishment whether they're a driver, pilot, plumber or whatever.

Honeywell appeared to disagree with this:

Honeywell said:

Andy Hill nearly died and lived by a miracle. That's nothing like deny driving, reckless driving or manslughter. Nobody would set out to in any way nearly crash a single engine fighter into the ground. So it's an accident and as was pointed out very early in this thread it is most likely simple pilot error. Happens all the time. Display flying is just a cruel mistress

So how was the Shoreham crash "nothing like reckless driving or manslaughter?

Edited by dr_gn on Thursday 18th August 09:41

[SilverSpur]

Publically expressing "deepest sympathy" for the bereaved would be enough without any admission of failure or guilt.

A simple, carefully worded statement. Heck even Tony Blair managed it.

[aeropilot]

[SilverSpur]

aeropilot said:

Please, you'll have to spell it t...

[Dr Jekyll]

anonymous said:

[redacted]

But you don't know what kind on incident it was until truth is established. To take the overtaking analogy, there may be circumstances where the overtaking driver genuinely believes he has a clear view because of a misleading feature of the terrain. His fault sure, but the chance of a recurrence may nevertheless be reduced by road engineering, providing the cause is known.

If the approach is to say 'let's just find someone to stick in the dock, then it's job done and target met' the cause won't be known. Not least because any surviving drivers from the accident will claim not to remember anything in case anyone who does say anything immediately becomes the prime suspect. This is why the AAIB try to keep the police at arms length.

[dr_gn]

Dr Jekyll said:

anonymous said:

[redacted]

But you don't know what kind on incident it was until truth is established. To take the overtaking analogy, there may be circumstances where the overtaking driver genuinely believes he has a clear view because of a misleading feature of the terrain. His fault sure, but the chance of a recurrence may nevertheless be reduced by road engineering, providing the cause is known.

If the approach is to say 'let's just find someone to stick in the dock, then it's job done and target met' the cause won't be known. Not least because any surviving drivers from the accident will claim not to remember anything in case anyone who does say anything immediately becomes the prime suspect. This is why the AAIB try to keep the police at arms length.

Irrespective of keeping the Police at arms length, any pilot involved in an incident like this must know they potentially face prosecution, and therefore why would they freely give information to the AAIB that might subsequently implicate them? It's not like they can give useful information to the investigation, then have it ignored during a prosecution.

[Dr Jekyll]

dr_gn said:

Irrespective of keeping the Police at arms length, any pilot involved in an incident like this must know they potentially face prosecution, and therefore why would they freely give information to the AAIB that might subsequently implicate them? It's not like they can give useful information to the investigation, then have it ignored during a prosecution.

Because they know perfectly well prosecution is only considered in exceptional cases, the AAIB aren't actively looking for someone to prosecute. So a pilot who says something like 'I simply forgot to put the wheels down because I got distracted' or 'in hindsight I should have turned back earlier' without worrying about how it might sound read out in court months later.

[dr_gn]

Dr Jekyll said:

dr_gn said:

Irrespective of keeping the Police at arms length, any pilot involved in an incident like this must know they potentially face prosecution, and therefore why would they freely give information to the AAIB that might subsequently implicate them? It's not like they can give useful information to the investigation, then have it ignored during a prosecution.

Because they know perfectly well prosecution is only considered in exceptional cases,

Wouldn't you consider this an exceptional case?

[Dr Jekyll]

dr_gn said:

Dr Jekyll said:

dr_gn said:

Irrespective of keeping the Police at arms length, any pilot involved in an incident like this must know they potentially face prosecution, and therefore why would they freely give information to the AAIB that might subsequently implicate them? It's not like they can give useful information to the investigation, then have it ignored during a prosecution.

Because they know perfectly well prosecution is only considered in exceptional cases,

Wouldn't you consider this an exceptional case?

Yes, which is exactly the problem.

[saaby93]

anonymous said:

[redacted]

All it seems at the moment is the pilot performed just about the same type of display any other pilot would have carried out given the plane and the event - wasn't it the same as previous years - so there isn't anything necessarily culpable in that.

The question is why did the plane end up lower than it should have been - which is why we're waiting for the AAIB report. It'll often be due to some sort of pilot error. Even if it's something up with the machine, the pilot's there to deal with it.
We'll have to see whether the pilot tried to do anything different to what any other pilot would do in the circumstances

[Mave]

dr_gn said:

Mave said:

dr_gn said:

I'm sure the vast majority of drivers involved in fatal accidents don't set out to crash their cars or kill anyone, but it's probably still going to be manslaughter. Why would the mode of transpost make the slightest difference?

There are what, 3000 deaths on the roads the UK every year? And approx 500 homicides with 80% being stabbings, shooting, hitting, strangling etc., and driving related cases falling into the 20% "other" category along with corporate manslaughter cases. So it's probably less than 5% of road death cases result in manslaughter.

What's the difference between "death by dangerous driving" and "manslaughter"? Surely it's pretty much manslaughter applied to road vehicles?

Irrespective of the terms, what I'm getting at is that causing death by accident doesn't absolve anyone from guilt or punishment whether they're a driver, pilot, plumber or whatever.

Well, the 2014 stats for death by dangerous driving convictions was 226, so still less than 10% of incidents where someone died.

So in the vast majority of crashes (>90%) where someone dies, the driver is NOT convicted or punished for manslaughter or DBDD.

[mybrainhurts]

dr_gn said:

What's the difference between "death by dangerous driving" and "manslaughter"? Surely it's pretty much manslaughter applied to road vehicles?

Irrespective of the terms, what I'm getting at is that causing death by accident doesn't absolve anyone from guilt or punishment whether they're a driver, pilot, plumber or whatever.

Hmmm...punishment for an accident.

This legal concept has long made me uneasy.

[jamieduff1981]

saaby93 said:

anonymous said:

[redacted]

All it seems at the moment is the pilot performed just about the same type of display any other pilot would have carried out given the plane and the event - wasn't it the same as previous years - so there isn't anything necessarily culpable in that.

The question is why did the plane end up lower than it should have been - which is why we're waiting for the AAIB report. It'll often be due to some sort of pilot error. Even if it's something up with the machine, the pilot's there to deal with it.
We'll have to see whether the pilot tried to do anything different to what any other pilot would do in the circumstances

It is worth getting this right. A Hunter test pilot shared a personal near-miss many years after the event where to arrived at the venue for the flight demonstration and spun the aircraft in to the display, recovered from the spin and levelled off at an uncomfortably low altitude. He realised at this point that he had neglected to reset the altimeter to Query Field Elevation before entering the display. It's a good example of how to be at the wrong height unintentionally with one very small erroneous omission.

I'm not suggesting it's applicable to Shoreham, but car drivers with no experience of flying probably assume that all instrumentation deals in absolutes (if he started off too low, lock him up), whereas altimeters in particular can read anything you want them to by twiddling a little knob on the bottom corner of the instrument - the reason for this is that the height above local ground level is what is needed for take-off, landings (and low level aerobatic airshows), whereas a common understanding of height is needed for navigation at higher altitude. In otherwords, air traffic control advise an air pressure setting for the airfield so that the altimeter reads zero feet on the ground there, but since all airfields are at different elevations above sea level and air pressure various regionally with weather, common other pressures are used - e.g. when up in air lanes where the airliners fly, everyone has their altimeter set to 1013mb because it's height relative to each other that matters at 30,000ft. Pilots have to switch between settings at different points in the flight.

[AW111]

mybrainhurts said:

Hmmm...punishment for an accident.

This legal concept has long made me uneasy.

It depends on how you define "accident".

If I were to drive flat out through a pedestrian mall, and accidentally run over a handful of pedestrians, it would be resonable for me to be punished.
We get the other argument here all the time : "no-one was hurt by my risky driving, so why am I being prosecuted?"

You can't have it both ways.

[DavidJG]

In this case, it would be appropriate to wait until the AAIB publishes their full report before trying to decide on blame for this. There are numerous possible scenarios, including entering the sequence too low (pilot error), control jam (not pilot error), engine failing to respond to throttle (not pilot error), etc. etc.

It's necessary to have a definite cause for the incident before deciding to take any action against the pilot. At this time, we're still waiting on the AAIB report, and from history this may take another several months or more to be published.